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Construction
and land development got a major fillip
on Thursday with the government throwing
open the sector to 100% foreign investment.
FDI will be allowed freely in development
of housing and commercial premises,
such as shopping malls, hotels, resorts,
hospitals, educational institutions,
recreational facilities and urban
infrastructure. The policy change
is expected to boost real estate supply
and quality. Expert opinion, however,
remains divided on its impact on prices.
The Cabinet approved this major initiative
of the commerce and industry ministry
aimed at boosting FDI inflows, creating
jobs, improving the quality of construction
and creating demand for building materials.
Courtesy:
The Times of India, February 25, 2005
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EU,
India Can Bring Global Stability
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Countries
have seemingly fallen over themselves
to outbid each other with offers of
help for the tsunami victims. No one
noticed that Europe had actually given
most: two billion dollars were pledged,
of which one third direct from Brussels.
This generosity is a reflection of
our people's genuine grief for the
victims. But it is also an expression
of our governments' interest in the
region. India too is taking on new
responsibilities, as we witnessed
recently when it joined a core group
of countries to steer rescue efforts.
The EU and India are seen as benign
forces, acting for global stability.
Their spheres of influence are increasing.
Jointly they can be much more effective.
Since five years the EU and India
have been holding annual high level
talks at the prime ministerial level.
The relationship has given birth to
meetings at senior officials' levels
and a continuous exchange of views
on trade and diplomatic issues. At
the last summit at The Hague on November
8, 2004, it was decided to upgrade
our relationship to a strategic partnership,
on a par with the EU's relationship
with the United States, Russia or
China. India responded immediately
and added some of its own ideas. All
these new initiatives build upon a
well established web of institutionalised
relationships and dialogues such as
EU-India, representing traditional
diplomatic soft power which might
be rather limited in scope during
crisis situations but would prove
indispensable in the long run. Paul
Steinmetz is the Ambassador of Luxembourg
to India. Luxembourg chairs the EU
till June.
Courtesy:
The Asian Age, February 22, 2005
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Survey
Reveals Gold Deposits Worth Rs 600
cr in Nilambur
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Gold
prospecting in the Nilambur belt in
Malappuram district by the Geological
Survey of India (GSI) and the Department
of Mining and Geology, Kerala, has
revealed presence of deposits estimated
to be worth Rs 600 crore at current
gold prices. Announcing this, Dr M.M.
Nair, Deputy Director-General, GSI,
told newspersons here that gold ore
reserves of 80,000 tonnes have been
identified in the Kottathara region
of Nilambur alone. Ore from the Kottathara
area is estimated to contain up to
13.8 gm/tonne of gold. According to
Mr Nair, mining is currently considered
viable for any ore sample that yields
up to a low of four gm/tonne of gold.
As part of the strategy for mining
in the area, the Department of Mining
and Geology, Kerala, is tying up with
the Mineral Exploration Corporation
for `cluster drilling' in the area,
said Mr N. Krishna Kumar, Director.
In Nilambur, the gold deposits lie
scattered. The State Mining and Geology
Department is now proposing to consult
with Hutti Gold Mines in Karnataka
for exploiting these minor deposits.
The GSI will also be involved in the
process, said Dr R.S. Nair, Director,
GSI-Kerala, who was also present on
the occasion. Meanwhile, mineral prospecting
in Kozhikode and Malappuram has revealed
five iron ore deposits from these
districts. The GSI-Kerala estimated
the reserves to be around 96 million
tonnes of low-grade iron ore. Bauxite
deposits have been identified in Neeleswaram
(Kasaragod) and some areas in Thiruvananthapuram
district.
Courtesy:
www.thehindubusinessline.com, February
21, 2005
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US
Brain Drain is India's Gain: Report
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The
highly-skilled, Indian- born talent
that once flocked to the US is now
returning home, "turning America's
brain drain into India's brain gain,"
a report released by a high-tech lobbying
group here said. Titled 'Losing the
Competitive Advantage? The Challenge
for Science and Technology in the
United States,' the report also says
that countries like India and China,
through the restructuring of their
economies, were dramatically increasing
the skill sets of their work force,
thereby posing a challenge to the
US leadership in the technology domain.
"Public-private partnerships (in India)
have invested in technical universities
and communications infrastructure
to create cutting-edge technology
parks in places like Bangalore. This
will only make India more competitive
and alluring to investors and multinational
companies," the report by AeA, formerly
known as the American Electronic Association,
says. India is embarking on further
reform to provide labour flexibility,
freer flows of capital, and desparately
needed infrastructure improvement,
it says adding that the country, along
with China, was catching up in critical
areas and has restructured their economy
to benefit from the free market system
they once resisted. "They are dramatically
increasing the skill sets of their
workforce, investing in research and
development (R&D), and adopting advanced
technologies, all to create wealth
and spur economic growth," the report
says cautioning that America can no
longer remain idle if it hopes to
continue its lead in science and technology.
Emerging countries are churning out
more scientists, engineers, and technology
workers to staff these nascent industries,
while the numbers of students entering
these fields in the United States
has remained flat.
Courtesy:
The Economic Times, February 17, 2005
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Engineering
'Oscars' for 5 NRIs
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The
significance of Washington's decision
to ease visa restrictions on foreign
scientists and academics has been
underscored again with the US National
Academy of Engineering's 2005 scroll
of honour containing several foreign-born
members, including five scholars of
Indian-origin. The five Indians who
have been named among this year's
74 new members are Subhash Mahajan,
Chair, Department of Chemical and
Materials engineering, Arizona State
University; Arunava Majumdar, Professor
of Mechanical Engineering, University
of California, Berkeley; R Shankar
Nair, senior vice president, Teng
& Associates, Chicago; Raja V Ramani,
Professor Emeritus, Mining and Geo-environmental
Engineering, Pennsylvania State University;
and, Subhash Singhal, Director of
fuel cells, Pacific Northwest National
Laboratory, Richland, Washington.
They have been recognised for their
work in areas such as semi-conductors,
fuel cells, nanotechnology, building
technology and coal mine safety. They
join an elite list of some 2000 engineers,
including around 50 Indians, who are
lifetime members of the National Academy
of Engineering and the National Avademy
of Sciences, the highest professional
distinction accorded to engineers
and scientists in the United States.
Previous years' honourees include
such familiar names as Stephen Hawking
and Bill Gates, Lee Iacocca and Lou
Gershner. Among the distinguished
Indian-American scientists and engineers
who are members of the NAE and the
NAS are Nobel Laureautes Hargobind
Khorana and Subrammanyam Chandrasekshar,
Amar Bose (of Bose speakers), former
Bell Labs President Arun Netravali,
C Kumar Patel, also formerly of Bell
Labs, Raj Reddy of Carnegie Mellon,
and Tom Kailath of Stanford University.
Courtesy:
The Economic Times, February 17, 2005
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Americans
Flock to India for Treatment
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A
reversal of medical tourism now has
Americans making a beeline for India,
seeking latest and cheaper treatments.
Until recently, it was the other way
round, with Indians rushing to the
US for better cure facilities. However,
with the state-of-art medical procedures,
equipment and facilities now available
in India, patients from developed
countries like Canada and Britain
are flocking to Indian hospitals.
The Indian medical fraternity conquered
the "final frontier" when Americans
too started coming here for the latest
medical procedures, which are either
not available in their country or
are much more expensive. Robert Walter
Beeney was unable to walk due to a
stiff hip when he landed in India
January 24. Twenty days later, he
not only recovered after a rare hip
replacement surgery at Apollo Hospital
here but also visited the famous Taj
Mahal in Agra after that. Another
patient from Florida will be landing
in Chennai for a similar procedure
at the Apollo Hospital there later
this week. Beeney, who came to know
about the procedure in India through
the Internet, said that since this
was not yet cleared by the US Food
and Drug Administration, he decided
to come to India. "This is despite
the fact that the device that is fixed
in the hip is made in the US," he
said. He also had other options like
going to Britain or Belgium for treatment.
"But I preferred India as the treatment
costs there are huge," he said. The
treatment in India cost him $6,600
(Rs 300,000) while the same as a part
of clinical trial in US would have
cost $24,000. Even in Britain, where
this procedure was first developed
a few years ago, it would have cost
12,000 pounds. The Apollo group, one
of Asia's largest private healthcare
providers, gets seven per cent of
its turnover from international patients.
The group's total turnover during
2003-04 was Rs 5 billion. The Apollo
group in India treated 43,000 foreign
patients during the last three and
a half years.
Courtesy:
Hindustan Times, February 16, 2005
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Five
Indian Americans Join Ranks of US
Engineering Elite
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Five
Indian Americans have been elected
to the prestigious National Academy
of Engineering (NAE), one of the highest
professional honours for an American
engineer, amongst 74 new members.
These notable Indian Americans honoured
for their major contributions to engineering
theory and practice, and for unusual
accomplishment in the pioneering of
new and developing fields of technology
are, Subhash Mahajan, Arunava Majumdar,
R Shankar Nair, Raja V Ramani and
Subhash C Singhal. Subhash Mahajan,
Chair, department of chemical and
materials engineering, Arizona State
University, Tempe, was honoured for
advancing understanding of structure-property
relationships in semiconductors, magnetic
materials, and materials for light-wave
communication. Arunava Majumdar, Almy
and Agnes Maynard Professor of Mechanical
Engineering, University of California,
Berkeley, was honoured for his contributions
to nanoscale thermal engineering and
molecular nanomechanics. R Shankar
Nair, senior vice president, Teng
& Associates, Chicago, was bestowed
the honour for his contributions to
the art and science of engineering
through the design of innovative bridges
and building structures.
Courtesy:
Hindustan Times, February 16, 2005
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Buddha
Bronze Idol could belong to 17-18
Century
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The
six-inch bronze idol of Lord Buddha
washed ashore near Chennai from South
East Asia by the tsunami could be
over 250 years old. Archaeological
Survey of India Superintending Engineer,
T Sathyamurthy, said that the statue,
found recently near Kalpakkam shores,
could belong to 17th or 18th century
and may be from either Myanmar or
Thailand. The statue, fitted in a
plate, was found by the residents
of Kalpakkam, 70 km from Chennai,
they alerted the National Institute
of Ocean Technology, which deputed
two senior scientists to inspect the
idol. Dr P Sasisekaran, one of the
scientists had said the idol was inside
a bamboo box. Two cups, normally used
for keeping flowers, were also found
in the box. Two 'monk ropes' were
also found along with the statue,
he said. It was surprising how the
statue, which was washed ashore, had
withstood the fury of tsunami, Sathyamurthy
said. A few days ago, a big block
of stone carvings had come to view
from under the water on the shores
of Mamallapuram near Chennai after
tsunami waves hit the coast. Some
of the sculptures include that of
lions, a horse, and a miniature cut-in
shrine. A structure at the ground
level consists of a fallen outer wall
and an inner wall, perhaps belonging
to a temple. A technical underwater
survey is likely to commence around
next month.
Courtesy:
Hindustan Times, February 16, 2005
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Indians
on Forbes Midas List
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Google
board member Ram Shriram is among
three Indian investors who have made
it to the top 10 in the Forbes Midas
100 list of venture capitalists. It
is for the first time that three Indians
have made it to the list. Shriram,
an early investor in Google, is ranked
sixth on the list which is topped
by L John Doerr and Michael Moritz.
Pramod Haque and Vinod Khosla, the
other two Indians, who are on the
eight and ninth position on the list,
however, have slid from the top two
slots they were occupying last year.
The Midas list seeks to identify individuals
who deploy venture capital to create
wealth for investors. The ranking
formula weighs most heavily the market
captilisation of a venture-backed
company on its first day of trading
or the purchase price in an acquisition.
Shriram, 48, who has made a steep
climb to the list, is believed to
hold around 5.1 million shares of
Google. Google shares are currently
trading at $180 per share.
Courtesy:
The Economic Times, February 14, 2005
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Desi
Power Hits Big in NY
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Indians
seem to be rocking in New York City
(NYC), having made it to a list of
the 20 largest foreign-born populations
in the megapolis, according to the
latest New Yorker report. With a population
of 68,263, they are 14th on the list.
Asian Indians, along with other immigrant
groups, make up 43 per cent of the
NYC workforce. Foreign-born Indians
in NYC are at the high end of the
educational spectrum as also that
for income distribution. There's more
good news. The average number of workers
per Indian household is 1.5 and the
median Indian household income is
$50,000. Only 14.4 per cent of the
Indian households are below the NYC
poverty line. A report on the NYC
immigrant profile, released by the
department of city planning, states
that 41 per cent of working Indian
males are in professional and managerial
positions. Out of this, around 8 per
cent are in the service sector, about
26 per cent in sales and office work,
6 per cent in construction, extraction
and maintenance, and about 19 per
cent in production, transportation
and material moving. She says the
Indian community has grown by 68.9
per cent in New York, with 84.8 per
cent of the population in the age
group of 18-64. The rate of home ownership
for Indians is 32.7. However 31.4
per cent of the Indian households
are overcrowded, says the report.
Courtesy:
The Times of India, February 12, 2005
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IIM-A
to Train Overseas Faculty
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The
Indian Institute of Management-Ahmedabad
(IIMA), the only management institute
in India that runs an exclusive faculty
development programme for top management
institutions, will now train management
faculty from 20 countries. The institute
signed a Memorandum of Understanding
(MoU) with Future Generation Foundation
(FGF), Egypt for setting such facilities.
Selected faculty members from management
institutions and universities in the
countries from the Middle East North
Africa (MENA) region would attend
the IIMA-charted courses both in Cairo
and Ahmedabad. The first batch from
MENA region is expected to attend
classes at the IIMA campus in Ahmedabad
in this summer. Indira Parikh, dean
of IIMA, who is also the co-ordinator
for the Accelerated Development Programme
(ADP) to be conducted by IIMA at Cairo
from May, told Business Standard on
Thursday, "This will be the first
such unique faculty development programme
to be conducted by any of the IIMs
or B-Schools of IIM stature in India.
The selected faculty members would
attend an intensive faculty development
programme in Egypt and Ahmedabad.
"While this is an attempt to improve
quality of managers in these countries,
IIMA would teach the faculty members
on various things including course
development, way of teaching and updates
on various developments on the management
sector along with global perspectives
in today's changing world." Algeria,
Bahrain, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Jordan,
Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Oman,
Pakistan, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi
Arabia, Sudan, Syria, Turkey, Tunisia,
the UAE and Yemen are the 20 countries
that come under the MENA region. Interestingly,
since 1987, IIMA has been conducting
four-month long faculty development
programme for major management institutions
in India and neighbouring countries
such as Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bangladesh
and Maldives. Bakul Dholakia, director
of IIMA, said: "This will help IIMA
take management education to Egypt
as well as the MENA region."
Courtesy:
The Business Standard, February 11,
2005
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India-Made
Handsets to get the World Talking
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Made-in-India
mobile phones will soon be rolled
out in Australia, New Zealand, South
East Asia and Africa. Japanese conglomerate
Kyocera, which has acquired the mobile
equipment division of CDMA technology
pioneer Qualcomm, is setting up a
mobile phone manufacturing plant in
India, and expects to ship phones
to Africa by the end of the year.
It plans to start shipping to countries
in South East Asia, Australia and
New Zealand next year. The company,
which is moving a big chunk of its
manufacturing for North American markets
to Mexico from San Deigo, already
sells phones made by an Indian manufacturer
to Nigeria. Interestingly, handset
majors had found it unviable to make
mobile phones in India till last year.
And now, soon after planning a manufacturing
base, companies are getting ready
to export these too. After handset
majors shying away from setting up
plants here for long, a flurry of
"Made in India" phones is set to hit
the market soon. While LG recently
started assembling phones in India,
Nokia, Samsung and Hyundai have also
announced similar plans. "Our manufacturing
operations should be ready this year
and we should start shipping to Africa
soon after that. We are also planning
to export phones to South East Asia,
Australia and New Zealand," confirmed
Soum Mukerjee, director (strategy),
Kyocera Wireless India. The company
has already exported 10,000 phones
assembled by XL Telecom in India to
Multilinks Telecommunications Services,
a large wireless service provider
in Nigeria. To begin with, the costing
differential would be in double digits
and will widen as volumes start picking
up, the company said. Kyocera Wireless
is a subsidiary of Kyocera International,
a Japanese conglomerate that makes
myriad products, ranging from materials
for dental implants to electronic
components. It entered the US cell
phone market in January '00 when it
bought wireless technology giant Qualcomm's
money-losing handset manufacturing
business. Since then, the company,
headquartered in San Diego, California,
has expanded its operations to include
facilities in Australia, New Zealand,
India, Brazil and Mexico, and employs
more than 3,000 people globally. Kyocera
Wireless makes handsets based on Qualcomm's
wireless technology, which is used
in about one out of five cell phones
worldwide.
Courtesy:
The Economic Times, February 09, 2005
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Indian
Firm to Build Sport Planes for US
Company
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India's
only private aircraft maker Taneja
Aerospace and Aviation Ltd (TAAL)
will build 25 two-seater sports planes
for an American aircraft firm Indus
Aviation Inc, to be sold in the US.
Taneja Aerospace will produce complete
knockdown kits (CKD) for the Thorp
T-1211 sports plane and ship to Indus's
unit at Texas in the US for the huge
American market. "We are producing
25 aircraft for the US market. Each
aircraft is valued at Rs 35 lakh,"
TAAL chairman Khushroo Rustumji told
PTI. Taneja will also produce 12 DGCA-certified
Thorp planes for the domestic market,
where Indus plans a series of flying
schools and offer the planes to flying
enthusiasts. Thorp T-1211 is priced
at Rs 35 lakh, but aircraft firms
sell at a lower price than the marked
rate. The publicly traded Taneja is
aiming at a revenue of Rs 15 crore
this fiscal and plans a turnover of
Rs 25 crore in 2005-06 with the new
aircraft order, besides eyeing a jump
in aircraft systems and components
from both Indian and foreign companies.
Indus Aviation president Ram Pattisapu
said the firm intended to promote
general flying in the country and
will hold talks with DGCA to grant
sports pilot licenses. "If India grants
sports pilot licenses, we can ship
fully built sports aircraft to the
US or we have to send systems and
components to the US and assemble
the aircraft there," he said.
Courtesy:
Hindustan Times, February 08, 2005
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India
to Mint Money for the World
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You
have seen the Made In India tag go
places. But have you ever thought
about a little bit of India on foreign
coins? Well, if things go according
to plan, India could soon mint a lot
of money for the world. Salem Steel
Plant, which makes coin blanks, is
in talks with a number of countries
for supply of stainless steel coins.
Salem has emerged the lowest bidder
in a Rs 50-crore Bangladesh government
tender for supply of 3,000 tonnes
of Taka 5 denomination coins. Negotiations
are on with Bhutan, Nepal, Maldives,
Philippines and Thailand. Additionally,
Salem is testing the waters in as
many as 50 countries to meet their
coining needs. "This is perhaps the
first time we are seriously looking
for business outside the country.
So far, we have been catering to the
needs of only one customer, the Union
ministry of finance," M Roy, executive
director, Salem Steel Plant told ET.
"We have entered into an MoU with
the government of India mints for
joint marketing efforts across the
world," he added. Salem, the only
public sector stainless steel manufacturer,
which has a 4,000 tonne coin-blanking
line, had pioneered the concept of
Re 1, 50 and 25 paise stainless steel
coins in the 90s.
Courtesy:
The Economic Times, February 05, 2005
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